Some Kind Of Wonderful
by Save Fearow
Summary: Oblina calls it an "ego-trip." She doesn't realize the power there is in a label. Valentine of sorts to the fans, with many callbacks to the series.


Some Kind Of Wonderful

An Aaaah! Real Monsters Fanfic

by Save Fearow

Author's Note: By now, it should be obvious that Ickis is a very flawed hero. (At least he likes the second part of that analysis.) Oblina has been keeping track of his many errors, and she's not pleased with him. See how many references you can spot, and if you're anything like Krumm, feel free to make it a "stinking game".

"You can NOT keep doing this, Ickis. Did you know that every time you get a little bit of recognition from our peers you turn into an overbearing, obnoxious jerk? You must know, or you would not KEEP doing it! Sometimes I think you enjoy turning your back on Krumm and I. Sometimes I think you are just immature. I fervently HOPE it's the latter because then there is a chance you will grow out of it, but it has been going on so long, I don't even know if you could stop it anymore!" Oblina scolded.

Ickis hung his head. He knew he deserved this lecture, Oblina had all but told him so. He was sure she would get around to stating it explicitly at some point, this was shaping up to be one of her longer rants. She paused, and took a deep breath. Yup, definitely one of longer ones.

"Do you remember when you found all those toenails and it kick-started your first ego trip? Persian silk worm rugs, daily mud-baths, an entire staff of yes-monsters at your beck and call, nothing was too good for the monster who has everything! Did you think Krumm and I would really stand for that? I'm surprised you didn't try to drain the river to recover your ill-gotten gains!" snapped Oblina.

He HAD promised several favors in order to borrow some scuba gear from Frunk (who knew the slimebucket had a hobby?) but the toenails were already gone when he got there. Come to think of it, so was that older monster, the one who used to work in the library with Nesdak, it was very peculiar how suddenly that geezer had announced his retirement. Oblina could never understand, her family had always been rich, with so many investments that even when they had the briefest brush with disaster, the losses were so small as to be negligible. He thought of telling her how as a bonsty he had lived under bridges alongside his father for several months, while Slickis entered numerous tournaments and signed an endorsement for the first-ever biography containing "Tales Of The Great Slickis". The fact that his father kept doing these things even after they'd rebuilt the home was a continued source of annoyance.

"And of course, there was the way you acted when your FATHER came to visit. I have never seen such a spoiled bonsty, rebuffing his every attempt to get to know you better! Did you even THANK him for saving your life? I bet you did NOT, because that would mean allowing the spotlight to shine on someone else for a moment." Oblina angrily exclaimed.

That was a low blow. He'd actually written 45 different apology drafts over the course of a month, and mailed 7 of them. Oblina should remember that, he'd used her stamps.

"That insatiable appetite for fame, isn't that why you had to disobey the Gromble and go back to Crazy Jed's Electronics so you could study the TVs? You knew it was dangerous but you didn't care! Whatever Ickis wants, Ickis gets! You had to build a forbidden object just to mesmorize the other monsters! You could have turned our entire class into po-tah-tos! Does that mean nothing to you?!" she hollered.

Potatos didn't have it so bad. In a pinch, you could still use them for sewerball practice. His friends wouldn't be neglected.

"You don't stop to consider how your actions affect other monsters. You stuck poor Krummy's eyes in the toilet-paper man, effectively blinding him! Why did you not have any sympathy for his plight, surely you've stumbled into enough objects over the years, or do you believe that as long as you're not the one suffering, whatever else happens is inconsequential?" roared Oblina.

But he had gotten those eyes back as soon as he was able! Krumm had already forgiven him, why couldn't she do the same? Besides, she was the one who always complained that his scares lacked innovation. If she'd let him borrow her lips, they could have frightened the entire museum staff, he was sure of it!

"You are so completely irresponsible! Who else could get their face printed on flash-paper not just once, but go on to have hundreds of copies made of it! Why do you think it was so hard to convince the other monsters to help you? It is because they know you are reckless, a walking endangerment to monsters worldwide! It is truly commendable that they would put aside their absolutely justifiable misgivings in order to lend a claw. Keep behaving in such a manner, Ickis, and you cannot expect them to EVER offer their assistance again!" she snapped.

He didn't expect much from the class anyway. Maybe a few snide comments, threats to tell the Gromble about his latest mishaps, and total abandonment the next time he had a combustion-related flare-up. No, he knew when to keep his expectations low. They only were interested in popular monsters, and glory was always fleeting.

"I'm even surprised that Krumm and I helped you, when you got stuck in Simon the Monster Hunter's brain! Of course you were not ready to try nightmare manipulation, you can't even be consistent in your size shifting. Looming and reverse-looming should not be used interchangably. Do you think your father has trouble deciding which form is better suited for the environment? No, I'm confident the Great Slickis can control himself!" Oblina snarled.

She'd never seen Slickis when he was "hit by the hungries." Ickis was pretty sure his dad had gotten the entire Red Barn restaurant chain shut down in the human world, after he'd run amok through the franchise's dumpsters. Talk about poor impulse control.

"Not like you, who just follows the first thought the flickers through your tiny, little mind. Why else would we have ended up aboard a garbage scow, floating across the sea! I could have drowned that day, and it would all have been your fault!" Oblina insinuated.

If she'd paid more attention to those swimming lessons, Oblina would have nothing to complain about. But Ickis had learned enough to know he'd be remiss to mention that now.

"Let's not forget the way you told the Gromble lies upon lies after breaking the Viewfinder! When have -I- ever needed you to rescue me?" she protested loudly.

There was the time she tried being hebopply during a hurricane. He'd braved the storm to find her and bring her home, and he would do it again in a heartbeat.

"You are the only monster in this entire universe who would think he could get out of a multi-scare assignment by cloning himself! In case you have not realized it, one of you is already more trouble than he is worth!" hollered Oblina.

He wasn't proud of those clones either. True, he'd taken credit for their scares, but he'd also been blamed for their mischief. On the whole, he came out of that mess worse off than anyone.

"Not that I was surprised that you would consider such an obviously ill-advised scheme to be workable. You are the same monster who fell for Chemira, Ignita, and Typhon's obvious lies. I told you monsters like that must have been imprisoned for a reason, but you had to find everything out the hard way!" she professed.

But they had seemed so friendly and sympathetic! Chemira had specifically mentioned young monsters getting blamed for things they didn't do, the same way the Gromble would punish an entire group, for the actions of an individual. How was he to know they were actually toenail robbers, what happened to giving someone the benefit of a doubt?

"You never can stay out of trouble. Even when you are told to leave a scare to a more expert classmate, such as myself, you still tried to hone in on my territory! Sometimes I wish I had just left you at the amusement park. You could have been that human's star attraction, just like you've always wanted!" Oblina claimed.

Sometimes he wished she'd left him there too. He seldom felt as though he belonged in the presence of such a masterful monster. Oblina was willing to go to the ends of the earth to get a scare, he was only willing to go as far as the infirmary, which is where he tended to end up whenever someone went overboard on an assignment. There were days when he could still feel that human's automobile driving over his foot.

"There are times when your obsession with humans is downright disturbing. We knew that nothing good could come from watching that cutesy-wutesy movie and yet you simply HAD to sit through it, and brag about it afterwards! If you had just listened to me, Zimbo would never have started following you around in that Cuddles costume, harassing you! I told you so!" explained Oblina.

Zimbo would have done something to bully him, anyway. He'd never done ANYTHING to that monster, unless you counted the week he went scaring with a mechanical flying thing. Even the Manual expressly stated that monsters could scare however they wanted, and that no one could claim the entire sky as a personal scaring zone. All he had been trying to do was add a little fun to his life, where was the harm in that?

"The only thing worse than you interfering with humans, is when you try to interfere with other monsters. It was your bright idea that I spend a weekend with Mumsy and Dada, and I was never so miserable in all my life!" she whined.

He thought she'd be happy there, he and Krumm always enjoyed visiting home. And it wasn't as if she was the only miserable monster on that trip, he'd -heard- her play the Anthraxichord. That alone was enough to convince him she should never be anything but a scare-monger. And her parents had warmed up to the idea, eventually, and even Lugo was getting rewarded for over a century of toenail collecting as their butler.

"You don't even stop with your friends, you have actually tried to meddle with the Gromble's love life!" Oblina yelled.

But the Gromble had come to all of them, asking for help. At first, he just wanted to get the Gromble to relax and stop sending him to the Snorch all the time. Once he saw how happy Nesdak had been with her date, he'd wanted them to continue. Of all the monsters in the Academy, Nesdak treated him with the most kindness. On a whim, he'd once written "get books on human musical theory" and shoved it in the library suggestion box. He'd never expected her to follow through on that, and he still believed he owed her a favor.

"It's no wonder the Gromble doesn't trust you. Even when he tries to teach you a lesson on responsibility, you just get carried away and end up breaking his very valuable Amulet of Enfarg!" shouted Oblina.

He didn't do it deliberately. He just wanted to try the Amulet on, see what it felt like to be a world-renowned scarer. And it had given him such a boost of confidence, he'd pulled off a very impressive loom. Of course he hadn't stopped to factor in how often looming was detrimental to accessories. (That was why he went through an average of 3 pairs of glasses, and 2 sets of contact lenses a year. You would think other monsters would just accept this and stop getting him replacements, but no! Oblina persisted in maintaining her warped sense of priorities, even though it meant that her Mumsy had started calling him "Moochy the Toenail-Taker, can't he be a little more careful, what fools these commoners be!")

"You even cause the Gromble problems in your sleep! I've never met another monster who would deliberately eat human food. If swallowing a seed could turn a monster into a tree, why would you assume a chocolate rabbit would be any safer?" questioned Oblina.

Because he hated rabbits, that's why! Humans were always mistaking him for something cute and fluffy. It had become a running joke among monsters too, and it hurt each and every time somebody called him a "lazy bunny". In fact, it hurt twice as much when it came from her lips.

"I worry about you, Ickis, I really do. You cannot survive in the human world un-escorted. Any monster who can get stuck in a toilet is not a monster who can take care of himself, not matter how many choruses of "I'm not a bonsty" he offers." Oblina insisted.

He wasn't a bonsty, you'd never even see a bonsty using the toilet by himself!

"Although, I s'pose THAT was at least semi-plausible. Getting yourself hypnotized, on the claw, was so bizarre you'd think it was an episode of Repugno's Believe-It-Or-Not!" snapped Oblina.

He didn't know she followed that series. He used to see ads for it on the back of his comics, although he quit reading those teasers after he'd sent away for the Hooked On Phobics kit. Maybe he should save up and buy her a subscription to Repugno's. It couldn't be any more awful than the Academy Newspaper. He was still boycotting that one on principle.

"I don't know which was worse, the way you behaved under hypnosis, or the way you acted when you were coated in wax from Mr. Sud's Car Wash!" she debated.

He definitely believed the wax was worse. He could at least remember what he was doing that day. Mostly what he had been doing was crashing into things, falling over, and getting laughed at. It wasn't too terribly different from any other day, it just seemed to last a little longer and leave a bigger headache.

"Most monsters would have difficulty topping that fiasco, but then you had to initiate a total nuclear meltdown!" she added.

Again, he head never wanted to go scaring there. All he was trying to do was go home, he never meant to get distracted by all those shiny buttons. Pressing them was a bit like conducting an orchestra, or adjusting the controls on a gigantic stereophonic sound system. Nobody would ever want to pass that up.

"But you could never be satisfied with a small, localized disaster. You had to threaten the existence of the entire monster world with your doodles!" proclaimed Oblina.

She'd always liked his doodles before. He used to consider it a minor hobby, but then he discovered how much those cartoons made her laugh. Sometimes he wanted to show her the other, more realistic drawings he made but he was afraid of what her reaction would be. She'd cried a little when she saw his family tree presentation, and he never wanted to upset her like that again. Besides, most of his portfolio work still wasn't a very good likeness, he needed to try harder at capturing the plumpness of her lips.

"You couldn't even step one foot out the door without endangering yourself. We've met monster criminals, but even THEY never spent time in a human prison!" she stated.

Yeah, that day was really unfair. He thought it was lucky to actually have a day off from school, but if that was the kind of thing that happened on vacation, he'd sign himself up for a Snorching every weekend from now until 2100.

"And finally there was the day the Gromble punished you by making you guard the clock of Rashtock. I don't rightfully know what you did then, but I bet it was awful!" declared Oblina.

If you considered nearly ripping a hole through the fabric of time-and-space to be awful, then yes, it was awful. Given enough time, he might be able to muster a defense for that one, but right now he was stumped.

"And that was but the briefest summation of your foibles! Just tell me why Ickis. Why do you persist in letting your ego overtake your common sense? Why must you always behave like a big shot even when you should be feeling your lowest? Why do you continually abandon any and all shreds of monster decency the instant the opportunity arises for you to get our attention? Why should you think that will accomplish anything? Why?" she demanded.

Ickis looked up at her with soulful eyes, pleading for understanding. If she only knew the most alluring aspect of fame! "They called me wonderful." he replied.

"That is not a valid reason!" Oblina insisted as she stormed off in a huff.

Ickis watched her leave, knowing there was nothing he could say to change her mind. "They called me wonderful." he repeated sadly. "...the way you never did."

~~~The End.

Author's Note: I think "Rosh O'Monster" makes it clearest that many of Ickis' wilder antics are designed to impress other monsters, particularly Oblina. Unfortunately for him they tend to have the opposite effect as she does not like to stick around him when he behaves in such a manner. This in turn, drives him to even greater extremes. It's a vicious cycle and neither of them are willing to take the steps to break free of it.


End file.
